Doctor MJ wrote:.
HeartBreakKid wrote:.
Missing Rings wrote:.
Joining the discussion late, and just quoting a few people who had commented some things I’ll be replying to below.
Doc - you’d mentioned that by “any metric you can think of” that Ray has the edge. But I find that’s actually not the case (shown below).
For the purpose of this comparison, I’m disregarding Carter’s last two seasons. No one is more TOTAL career value than me, but realistically his last two seasons don’t really add any relevant career value (arguably slightly above replacement level in ‘17, so that perhaps does add a pinch for me, but it’s so negligible…); but they’ll drag his career metrics down, and I don’t want to “penalize” him in that way in a comparison to Allen. So I’m using just his first 18 seasons (to compare to Allen, whose career was 18 seasons)......
Allen’s prime was marginally longer, imo (I’d call ‘00-’09 prime Allen, whereas Vince’s really only goes ‘00-’07). But nonetheless I’ll compare those 10 years of Allen to Carter’s 10 best years (which are also ‘00-’09).....
Allen (‘00-’09 rs): 20.7 PER, .167 WS/48, +3.8 BPM, +7 efficiency differential in 37.9 mpg (728 games).
Carter (‘00-’09 rs): 21.5 PER, .151 WS/48, +4.1 BPM, +3 efficiency differential in 37.8 mpg (727 games).
That’s pretty well a dead heat as far as box-based rate metrics are concerned.
Ray Ray’s non-prime years were often at a higher level than many of Carter’s, and thus his career looks slightly better than Carter’s first 18 seasons collectively:
Allen (career rs): 18.6 PER, .150 WS/48, +3.0 BPM, +6 efficiency differential in 35.6 mpg (1300 games).
Carter (‘99-’16 rs): 19.6 PER, .137 WS/48, +3.1 BPM, +3 efficiency differential in 32.4 mpg (1274 games).
Tiny statistical edge to Allen on basis of his numbers (which are basically a wash with Carter’s) coming while playing ~10% more mpg (also missed 26 fewer games).
Comparison of playoff numbers shakes out similarly, overall.
However, if we add in consideration of impact metrics……
Regardless of source, if we look at Carter’s 10 best RAPM’s added, it’s a little better than Ray’s 10 best years. These too are rate metrics, however; and though both players have some of their higher RAPM’s in non-prime (lower minute) years, Ray would have a little advantage in mpg over these years (which
might turn this into a wash, more or less???).
Carter often appears to have more impressive on/off numbers from year to year in his prime, fwiw. However, it’s not as consistently reflected in the team offensive results: it’s a little troubling for me that Carter was member to numerous mediocre (or even kinda poor) offenses; that the Raptor’s offense didn’t appear to suffer much for his leaving, and that the Nets offense doesn’t improve when adding him.
With Allen, otoh, we
appear to see a more consistent relationship between his presence and the team’s [good] offensive performance. He’s at the helm of multiple elite offenses in his prime; a little too frequent for it to feel like coincidence or riding someone else’s coat-tails (especially when the “someone else’s” were guys like Glenn Robinson [somewhat a chucker], Sam Cassell [very good, but not great], Tim Thomas [OK], Ervin Johnson [defensive role player], etc).
Where does all this leave us? Well, that’s for everyone to decide for himself. But to Carter’s credit, this is hardly a comparison in which “nearly every metric” is in Allen’s favour. Jsia….
Regarding rings, which Bizil had argued for…….
I don’t know if the shouting/rant tone (all caps, multiple exclamation points, etc) got under people’s skin and provoked a bit of a gang-up mentality…...but people were really coming at him over that. Thing is, the rings factor is not an invalid consideration to many people (
most of “the masses”, I would say, think it relevant, whether that’s right or wrong). But I’d probably be lying if I said it didn’t mean at least
a tiny bit to me.
Bizil was accused of forcing his criteria down the throats of others; but to Missing Rings, HBK, dhsilv2, anyone else who was stating rings are largely circumstantial (luck) and thus shouldn’t be considered, bear in mind: in stating this you are essentially trying to force YOUR criteria on to him (and others). He may have been more emphatic about it, but…...door swings both ways.
A few posters appeared to take issue with giving much credit to Ray’s rings based on Allen’s role with both those teams. I believe it was HBK who even invoked the “lol” in relation to his roles on those teams. I don’t quite get that. He was basically an All-Star in his own right and the 3rd-best player on the title team the first time. 3rd best player on a title team is nothing to sneeze at in an historic sense. That puts him in the company of guys James Worthy, Robert Parish, Dennis Rodman, Horace Grant, Draymond Green [except to some], Rasheed Wallace, etc. Unless we’re saying those guys didn’t matter to those teams either…..
For the 2nd one he was still an above average player in 26 mpg; that indicates still a pretty relevant piece of that team, too.
Neither one was like Robert Parish’s ring with the ‘97 Bulls; far from it.
Anyway, my two cents on things. And it all sort of indirectly indicates why I rank Allen ahead of Carter (but not by a huge amount).
"The fact that a proposition is absurd has never hindered those who wish to believe it." -Edward Rutherfurd
"Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities." - Voltaire
